ARCADIA, Calif. – A gray gelding with a white tail, cantankerous attitude, and a rags-to-riches history marches toward the Breeders’ Cup Sprint by running in an unorthodox prep race Saturday at Santa Anita.
Lovesick Blues, who won a $12,500 maiden-claiming race at Golden Gate Fields long before he won a Grade 1 this summer at Del Mar, is favored Saturday in the $100,000 California Flag Handicap, a hillside turf sprint for California-breds.
The 6 1/2-furlong race is unusual for a BC Sprint candidate. Horses do not normally prep for that race by running in a statebred turf sprint. Lovesick Blues, upset winner of the Grade 1 Bing Crosby Stakes last out, is not normal – and he needs to blow off some steam.
“He needs to do something. He’s tearing down the barn,” trainer Librado Barocio said this week at Santa Anita while watching Lovesick Blues train. “We have to take some of that vinegar out of him. He’s feeling good.”
After the Bing Crosby upset by Lovesick Blues in late July, Barocio initially planned to train him into the Breeders’ Cup but changed his mind.
“I’m going to be running against the best horses in the world, the fastest horses in the world [in the BC Sprint],” he said. “I’d better be on my game.”
Lovesick Blues will need to be on his game Saturday also, because the California Flag is not a walkover for the 126-pound topweight. The field includes multiple stakes winner Man O Rose, stakes winner Shea Brennan, stakes-placed front-runner Book Smart, and stakes-placed Cali Cat. Other entrants include Sir Rocket, Stamp My Passport, and Flyover.
For bettors siding with the chalk, Lovesick Blues is problematic. He is the current class of the field and proven on the hill, but eight starts on the hill produced five in-the-money finishes and no wins. And the Saturday stakes race is obviously not his main objective. It is merely a Breeders’ Cup prep for the 5-2 program favorite, whose rider is Geovanni Franco.
“We’re going to try to win,” Barocio said before adding a caveat. “Geovanni and I talked about what our goal is. Coming down the hill helps him not have to expend all that energy, as opposed to running full speed on the dirt.”
Wednesday morning at Santa Anita, Lovesick Blues reminded everyone that he marches to his own beat. Galloping into the stretch, he wheeled and propped for no apparent reason.
“He’s ornery, he’s got a mind of his own,” Barocio said. “Sometimes, you can’t get him in the shed row.” Before he joined the Barocio stable late last year, he would throw a tantrum after a win by refusing to enter the receiving barn. Lovesick Blues, a 7-year-old now owned by Barocio’s Mia Familia Racing Stables, has won nine races and $770,000 from 41 starts.
Man O Rose also has idiosyncrasies. An 8-for-15 Cal-bred stakes winner trained by Jeff Mullins, he scored a loose-on-the-lead comeback win last out in a route stakes at Los Alamitos. Man O Rose runs best on the outside. Trouble is, post 6 of 8 is like an inside post on the hill, because the course bends immediately to the right.
“He’s going to have horses all around him,” Mullins said. “We just don’t know how he’s going to handle it. All his bad races were on the inside. He’s got a couple little quirks that we just have to deal with.”
Man O Rose, whose rider is Edwin Maldonado, has won $380,965 for owner-breeders Bruce and Bev Zietz. One could argue Man O Rose is the most likely winner, assuming he gets to the outside and avoids a duel with front-runner Book Smart.
Shea Brennan is a 3-year-old stakes winner trained by Phil D’Amato making his first start on turf. John Sadler trains two upset candidates, lightly raced Flyover and 3-year-old Cali Cat, who ran one of the best races of his career finishing second in a stakes race in his only start on the hill.
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